Friday, June 26, 2009

Seeing as how the month of July is rapidly approaching and my motivation to engage in productive activities at the office that do not involve professional rasslin' and/or Arabian Facebuster on a sunny, 85+ degree Friday afternoon is rapidly diminishing, I thought it fitting that Arabian Facebuster spend the next few Fridays chronicling some of the matches, feuds, angles, and promos of The Great American Bash, the National Wrestling Alliance's mid-1980s summertime venture into red state America's finest memorial coliseums, farm expo centers, and cookie cutter professional sports facilities.

The 1986 Great American Bash tour -- officially 14 cities in 30+ days with a number of spot shows thrown in for good measure -- was arguably the apex of the Crockett controlled NWA as a promotion. Hopefully you all can appreciate the magnitude of such a statement...that's right, the pinnacle of what in my loudmouthed, disgruntled, blowhard opinion was the greatest rasslin' promotion of all time.

And what a tour it was. You had "Nature Boy" Ric Flair defending the prestigious NWA World Heavyweight Wrestling Championship against all comers, from Dusty Rhodes, to Ron Garvin, to Magnum T.A., to Wahoo McDaniel, to Ricky Morton, and as you will see in the clip above, to Road Warrior Hawk. You got Magnum and Nikita waging a best of seven series for the held up United States Heavyweight Title. You had the Minnesota Wrecking Crew (Ole and Arn Anderson) wreaking havoc on the likes of Dusty Rhodes and The Rock &/or Roll Express. Tully Blanchard taking on Ron Garvin in taped fist matches. The Midnight Express and Jim Cornette battling the bootylicious Baby Doll and whatever babyface tag team combination she could implore (read: have pre-Bash carnal relations with) to be her partners. The Road Warriors against the Russians. Wahoo McDaniel challenging Jim Garvin to Indian Strap Matches around the horn. Hyperbolic, sentence fragment cheerleading and mustached, complete sentenced analysis from David Crockett and Tony Schiavone, respectively. And of course who could forget Jimmy "The Boogie Woogie" Man Valiant's protracted war with Paul Jones' Army!?!?

The clip above no doubt aired in the Philadelphia market on one of the NWA's syndicated programs (World Wide or Pro) in order to build up the big Veterans Stadium card which kicked off the 1986 tour.

Enjoy the boasts, taunts, and threats of two of the finest promo men in the history of the business!

Late Update: Arn is eluding to this incident from the autumn of 1985 in his promo.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

What do you get when combine two beefcakes with a penchant for idling on motorcycles and old jalopies

vintage hot rods, defacing an already spray paint inundated edifice, revering the Confederacy, accessorizing blue jeans with either 80s neon tops straight out of a Punky Brewester yard sale or the finest in S&M attire, interminable bicep flexing, periodic shirtlessness, and standing two feet or closer to your tag team partner at all times with the garrulous managerial stylings of one Jimmy Hart?

The Dirty White Boys, who I'm pretty sure are/were Len Denton (who spent some time in Portland and World Class under a hood as The Grappler) and Tony Anthony (who wrestled throughout the southern based territories in the 1980s and early 1990s as the Dirty White Boy).

This homoerotic Aryan supremacy oriented footage was produced by the closeted good ol' boys of the Memphis/CWA territory, circa 1983/1984. Natch.

No word on whether these guys ever got it on with The New Generation inside -- or for that matter outside -- the squared circle. Ha!

Please enjoy...on a strictly "final project for the queer studies course I am auditing at the local community college" level.

But thanks to the editing prowess of Youtuber browns64d, Arabian Facebuster can finally feature all of Rocky Mountain Thunder's blown spots, botched moves, and other assorted fuck ups during his two month reign of terror on the American Wrestling Association's jobber pool in one concise video package.

Enjoy.

Oh, and if you would prefer a non-Garth Brooks/nu country yet still appropriately "themed" tune to accompany all of this vintage Rocky Mountain ineptitude, mute the volume on the player above, right click here to open this clip in a new tab or window, then crank it up.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Booker extraordinaire George Scott, who cut his teeth booking for Stu Hart's Stampede Wrestling, helped transform Mid Atlantic (Jim Crockett, Sr) from a tag team based to a singles focused in the 1970s, was the matchmaking force behind the first Wrestle Mania and Saturday's Night Main Event in the Vince McMahon led World Wrestling Federation (1984-1986), and had a cup of coffee booking in the Jack Adkisson controlled World Class Championship Wrestling and Jim Crockett, Jr. controlled National Wrestling Alliance after his stint in Titanland.

Some pretty informative articles on George Scott featuring some tidbits and anecdotes on the interworkings of da business are conveniently linked for yr perusal here and here.

Monday, June 22, 2009

B. Brian Blair, everyone's favorite Killer Bee has set th' interwebs abuzz this weekend with a stinging report of his arrest! Seems all's not well back at the Blair Family Hive as his teenage kids are obviously out late perhaps flitting from flower to flower:

"According to the arrest report, Blair, shoved his son Brett in the chest at about 4am Sunday morning. When Brett tried to walk away, Blair grabbed him, punched him in the face and put him in a choke hold, the report states. He then let go of Brett, grabbed younger son Bradley by the throat and punched him, deputies said. Both sons identified their father as the person who attacked them, and Blair was taken to the Hillsborough County jail on two felony counts of child abuse.

Blair appeared in a Florida court this morning after spending last night in jail. The presiding judge in this morning's proceedings ordered Blair to be released from jail and turned over the case to the Department of Children and Families. "

And what a card they have assembled for the cretins, mutants, inbreds, filthy degenerates, online fantasy gamers, mom's basement dwellers, and chronic masturbators of the Twin Cities metropolitan area this evening. The lazy right eyed and as of last Saturday night former Ring of Honor Champion Jerry Lynn takes on serial Chynapoontang destroyer and caboose plower X-Pac. Flippityfloopityfloo on parade as Cody O'Neil battles Arik Cannon and then, win, lose, or draw, retires from squared circle competition. Also booked, Danny Havoc, who will spend 8 minutes plundering 6% Body Fat Rob James with a barrage of whimsical weaponry.

I previewed the card on daol' Facebuster last month, so if you want to revisit some Malibu snark regarding tonight's star studded shenanigans, go here.

I'll be back this weekend or early next week with some highlights. Until then, I leave you with these introspective lyrics, set to the music of Glen Goza:

Here at Arabian Facebuster, we've been put through the sports entertainment blogosphere ringer for staking out a number of unorthodox bordering on antagonistic and antithetical opinions and assertions when it comes to this noblest of diversions. These include: (a) longing for The Animal Batista to suffer an injury that gives us a permanent sabbatical from his bulgy, veiny, kicky, punchy antics; (b) proclaiming loudly and proudly our unrequited love for Buck "Rock and/or Roll" Zumhoffe and his sparsely attended traveling rasslin' carnival featuring a gaggle of midgets and the daughter that sprung from his now sure to be calcified and atrophied loins; (c) enabling Larry Nelson's alcoholism through our incessant cheerleading of his inebriated, disheveled, and shaggy exploits; and (d) dreaming that, in the event a band of dastardly terrorists should again launch an attack inside our proud, resourceful, and woefully corpulent country, that they project their grievances, frustrations, and outrage with America's interventionist foreign policy orientation and Judeo-Christian values on TNA's Impact Zone located at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida.

On the record, we stand by these proclamations wholeheartedly. And we would like to add another, far less contentious although certainly no less awesome proposition to this list: Watching the debonair "Handsome Half Breed" Gino Hernandez (along with his [original] "The Dynamic Duo" partner the epitome of chickenshit heeldomTully Blanchard) obliterate the forehead of "The Ragin' Bull" Manny Fernandez via stiff right hands, vicious kicks, and with a few belt buckle shots thrown in for good measure. This footage comes from the Southwestern Championship Wrestling (San Antonio) territory (which was owned and promoted by Tully's dad Joe Blanchard), circa early 1980s.

In the sage words of the grizzled sounding play-by-play guy, this in fact will be one of the most horrible displays of sportsmanship that you will ever seen in yr life! But not to worry, for Gino and Tully will get their comeuppance soon enough.

Please enjoy this clip of the late, great Gino Hernandez...why we watch professional rasslin'.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009

Here at Arabian Facebuster, we didn't take kindly to the tribal back tattooed, oft injured, limited in-ring abilities, and all around foot inserted snugly in mouth outside of the protective bordering on smothering WWE bubble antics of one Mister Kennedy...[oh for fuck's sake]...Kennedy, seen here hopefully taking in his final gasp of air before meeting an untimely, premature, yet well earned demise. However, like this smug peroxide blond youngster's former employer -- the utterly predictable bordering on apathetic booking, status quo embracing World Wrestling Entertainment -- we wish Mr. Kennedy well in any and all of his future endeavors, assuming he survives the ensuring reptile attack.

But fret not, admirers of Kenneth's inimitable brand of sports entertainment mediocrity, for Mr. Kennedy is likely to land on his feet (albeit tearing his ACL in the process, hardy har har!) in the form of a lucrative contract with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling!, a main event babyface spot and feud with The Main Event Mafia, followed two months later with a tease of joining the very group he feuded so boringly with for all of those weeks, followed by his shockingly unshocking admission that it was all an elaborate ruse on his part to infiltrate the group's washed up, unmotivated ranks, followed by an unexpectedly expected, unpersuasively explained/justified heel turn/union with his sworn arch enemies, followed by several weeks of running roughshod through TNA's babyface ranks, followed by another momentum derailing injury and/or illicit substance related suspension, followed by a much hyped comeback interspersed with his trademark catchphrase heavy, substance light promo work, followed by pretty much a step-by-step rehash of the TNA! preferred booking scenario that I just painstakingly laid out above...but with even more whimsy.

If Nostradamus were alive today, I'm sure he'd be the first to concede that he is Arabian Facebuster's bitch when it comes to professional rasslin' related revelation and prophecy.